Monsters have a bunch of funky powers and descriptors that can get attached to them. The different kinds of Hits and Damage, as well as the various different powers available to monsters, are described in the Monster Powers section below. Note the difference in terminology between small m “monsters” (the creatures the PCs face) and capital M “Monsters” (the people playing those creatures).The stats for monsters will be presented as follows:

There's a lot of weirdness out there in the big wide world, so GMs can feel reasonably free to make monsters up as they go along. There are a couple of guidelines people should stick to, and some general conventions people should follow.

First, the guidelines. The White City world tries to avoid generic monster types, firstly because the designers were pretentious that way and secondly because it tries to keep the setting reasonably coherent and the problem with orcs and elves is that people tend to associate them with an awful lot of baggage that this setting really doesn't include. Introducing a sentient race into the setting is a major addition, so please give it some thought. Even more importantly, if you wish to use magical creatures please bear in mind the nature of magic in the setting. Magic in the world of the White City usually doesn't produce things like golems or elementals.

A weak monster type will have 1 or 2 hits per location and do Singles or Halves. Monsters with more than 4 hits per location are usually formidable, particularly if this is combined with the ability to deal extra damage. Monsters with damage immunities and the like are particularly dangerous. Spellcasting monsters are often terrifying. A single Ethereal creature of average strength will generally be more than a match for any character who's not a Sorcerer or Priest.

Making Monsters More Dangerous: Having designed your species of monster, you may find that the PCs just wade through them like they aren't there. Here you have a problem, because monsters that are too weak are boring, but monsters that are just arbitrarily beefed up are a bit silly. The best way to make monsters more dangerous is to up their numbers. Sure one bandit is no challenge, but if they start coming in Waves (see below) you're on far safer ground (or less safe, depending on your point of view). It's also relatively easy to justify monsters appearing in force, when it isn't easy to justify them starting to do extra damage.

The alternative is to use exceptional individuals. Use this sparingly. Individual monsters with more Dodges, Parries, Hits and Damage than the norm can be hauled out as long as it doesn't go too far. In general it's suggested that you can get away with having one or two monsters with an extra point of damage, or a 50% hit bonus amongst a group. This is a particularly useful tactic if there's one PC who is particularly problematic. The final option is to give monster leaders the equivalent of the Leadership or Tactician skills.

Making Monsters Less Dangerous: This one is actually far easier to do, but harder to get right. The simplest way to do this is to just ask the Monsters to go easy on the PCs. On the other hand if you do this the monsters may come off as being a bit crappy. A better solution will be having the monsters trying to take the PCs alive and striking to subdue. Alternatively have the monsters fight and argue amongst themselves during combat or portray them as extremely gullible or just plain cowardly.

Most creatures will have a certain number of Body hits per location. As with PCs, a limb will stop working when it loses all its hits, and the creature will fall unconscious or die when their torso loses all its hits. Most creatures also have set totals of Fatigue Hits and Psyche Hits in the same manner as PCs. There are, however, a couple of variations on this:

Global Hits - Rather than having a certain number of hits per location, the creature has a set number of total Body hits. When all these hits are lost they fall over, but until that point they are unimpaired by any damage they've taken. Creatures with Global Hits are often insubstantial or supernatural, tend to ignore Fatigue Hits and may or may not have Psyche Hits.

Psyche Hits - An ethereal creature or spirit has no physical form and can only be injured in Psychic Combat.

Most creatures inflict standard Singles, Doubles, etc. Some creatures can inflict Psychic damage with their physical attacks, others can only inflict damage in Psychic Combat. Some creatures can inflict Paralysing or Vitrifying damage - see below for details.

Enchanting Music - This creature plays music which renders listeners incapable of doing anything much else except listening. The music's spell is broken the moment anybody in the vicinity takes violent action.

Ethereal - This creature is a spirit with no physical presence. It is immune to physical damage and Fatigue and can initiate Psychic Combat at will. Until it initiates Psychic Combat it may only be attacked by someone with the Exorcist skill or the ability to do Psychic damage with magic or with physical attacks.

Flight - This creature can fly. Flying Monsters should constantly call out their height above the ground in feet; they can be attacked with melée weapons while below ten, and can attack back when at eight or below. A flying monster can ascend at around one foot a second, they can however dive considerably faster.

Hard to Kill - This creature will not actually die except under specific circumstances. If “killed” it will collapse and stay down for 30 seconds, after which it will get up again with half its starting hits left. If no special circumstances are given, dismemberment often works. Severing a limb requires “killing” the creature and then reducing that limb to minus its starting hits. This creature also ignores all Fatigue damage, but can still be knocked unconscious.

Immunity [Type] - This creature is immune to something. Common immunities include edged weaponry, fire, weapons forged by man, weapons not wielded by women (the traditional “no man can defeat me” prophecy) and so on. Damage immunities should never be general, although they can be broad (everything except mistletoe, for example). Most importantly of all “immune to non-magical” is not a viable effect in this system, magical steel/fire/lightning/glass is no different to normal steel/fire/lightning/glass.

Insubstantial - Either the creature is actually a swarm of small creatures or the creature has little physical presence. Either way skilful or strong attacks make no difference to this creature, all hits inflicted upon it count as Halves (unless inflicted by Light Magic). These creatures always have Global Hits and ignore Fatigue damage.

Magic Resistance [Form] ([X]) - This creature is immune to spells of a particular Form of magic up to and including level [X], e.g. a creature with Magic Resistance Blood (2) would be immune to all first and second level Blood Magic spells.

Maneater - When this creature takes someone down they will stop fighting and start eating their victim, unless forced to defend themselves, dealing an additional hit to a location of the Monster's choice every 15 seconds. This could easily kill a character if not stopped.

Paralysis - Being hit by this creature on a location which has no armour left causes Paralysis. Over the course of the next few minutes the target will begin to find all movement restricted. The Paralysis will last until cured by alchemy or magic (such as a purification potion, Blood Cure or Purification) or for one hour of game time for each Body hit of paralysing damage taken. Characters with Herbalism may be able to find certain plants that alleviate Paralysis at the GM's discretion.

Parry (X) - This creature has X Parries per Encounter.

Poltergeist - Allows an Ethereal creature to strike for physical damage, usually by manipulating physical objects with the force of their will. Unless they choose to initiate Psychic Combat only a character with the Exorcist skill or the ability to do Psychic damage with magic or with physical attacks can strike back at them.

Shapeshifting - This creature has the ability to assume one or more alternate forms of some sort.

Unrelenting - Common for undead. Unrelenting creatures ignore all hits to the Torso, they keep coming with whatever limbs they have remaining until those limbs are rendered inactive. They also ignore Fatigue damage.

Vitrify - Being hit by this creature on a location which has no armour left causes Vitrification. Over the course of the next few minutes, hours or days the target will slowly start turning to glass. The process can be cured by alchemy or magic (such as a purification potion, Blood Cure or Purification). There are also creatures which can turn people to glass by other methods, and legends of some rare creatures who can turn people to stone or other substances.

Waves - This creature tends to attack in great numbers. When one creature is killed the Monster playing it will run off a short distance and then declare that they are “returning as a new creature” and come back as another one. Usually there will be a finite number of Waves in any encounter. Creatures with Waves in their description are just the ones which most commonly attack in numbers, many other creatures will also attack in Waves under some circumstances.

Worry - A common power for Maneater types. A creature with the Worry ability will latch on to anyone they hit and inflict a Single every other second with what usually amounts to an extremely tenacious bite. Most (but not all) will let go when sufficiently damaged. Note that you should never actually grab hold of somebody in LARP combat, just lay your hands on the target location and say “Worry” to represent the fact that you've latched on.

A note on the distinction between Hard to Kill, Unrelenting and Immunity. Basically the first implies that the monster or character can only be killed under specific circumstances but could (potentially) easily be defeated. Immune characters are pretty much unstoppable if you're relying on things that they're immune to. Unrelenting creatures are midway between the two, they're hard to stop but it tends to be a matter of firepower or effort rather than knowing what to use.

All good settings need some examples of commonly encountered monsters for people to crib from. So here they are. Note that this information is presented strictly out of character, and subcategorised for your convenience.

By far the most common creatures in the world of the White City, and still by far the most common antagonists for the game, humans are all over the place. Though near infinite in their diversity they nonetheless benefit from having some generic templates written up.

The Innocent Villager

The world is full of these, usually trying to sell people pies or in some form of terrible peril.

1 Body / 5 Fatigue / 5 Psyche / Halves / none

The Brigand

There are even more of these. They crop up all over the place, often posing as “woodcutters” or pedlars. Sometimes it seems that banditry is the only means of gainful employment available to half the population.

2 Body / 5 Fatigue / 5 Psyche / Singles / Dodge (1)

The Guardsman

Soldiers, guardsmen and the like will be better trained and better armed than most bandits. Note that the differences in hits between bandits and guardsmen is largely due to armour.

2 Body + Light Armour / 5 Fatigue / 5 Psyche / Singles / Parry (1)

The Leader

Be it of the guard or of the horde of bandits, you'll get the odd superior individual, better armed and trained than their men.

The Great Forest to the West of the White City is the domain of the Old Powers and full of their creatures. It is also populated by wild feral animals, Weavers, trolls and mysterious entities that lurk in the depths of the Forest far from human civilisation.

Giant Spiders

These vary in size and strength; some are the size of large dogs, some the size of horses, some larger still. They're fast and their bite usually carries a paralysing venom. Particularly large female spiders develop mentally and psychically as well until they begin to blur the line between “giant spider” and “Spider-Queen”; These will have far more Psyche hits and may have additional abilities at the GM's discretion.

The Weavers are strange residents of the City of Silk and the Great Forest. They are shorter than humans and far thinner, with long nimble fingers. They have some kind of association with the spiders which form the basis of the entire economy of the City of Silk. They speak only in whispers and have long sharp poisonous fingernails. They seem to have been capable of living in peace with humans thus far. See the Non-Humans page for more information.

We know 'em, we love 'em. They're sleek, dangerous and hunt in packs. They also give those who are so inclined an excuse to howl at the moon. The wolves of the White City world tend to be far more aggressive than wolves in the real world.

3 Body / 7 Fatigue / 3 Psyche / Doubles / Waves, Worry, Maneater

Children of the Vine

Seemingly intelligent, the Children of the Vine (sometimes referred to as “Vine-Children”)look entirely human except for their eyes, which are either pure white or blood red depending on how hungry they are. Swift, powerful and in service to the Old Power known as the Lady of Blood and Wine, the Children of the Vine have a penchant for blood and wine in equal measure and will generally take whichever option is the easiest. Apparently they throw very good parties, if you can survive until the end of the evening. See the Non-Humans page for more information.

3 Body / 8 Fatigue / 5 Psyche / Singles / Dodge (3), Maneater

Trolls

There are some aspects of trad fantasy that we just can't pass up… Trolls, about half as tall again as a man, they aren't precisely intelligent but have a kind of low cunning and are sometimes capable of understanding human speech. They tend to keep to dark wet places and live alone or in pairs. They don't actually eat people but do have a penchant for pony meat. The only way to permanently damage them is with fire.

6 Body / Fatigue n/a / 5 Psyche / Doubles / Hard to Kill

Firedrakes

These large lizard-like creatures are wingless, clawed and fanged, able to breathe fire chemically rather than magically. They are pure carnivores, with iguana-like patience but the ability to move like a scalded troglodyte when necessary. Said to have been created by the Lord of Sand & Stone in collaboration with the Lady of Serpents. Their tough scaly hide acts like armour, so they are vulnerable to Through damage. They predominantly live in the Northern reaches of the Great Forest, where the bones of the land are beginning to show toward the foothills of the mountains. Their ability to breathe fire does ranged Global damage to a single target, but is a limited resource.

Creatures with the legs of animals and the upper bodies of men, this category also includes centaurs, fauns and a load of other half-human things. They're usually intelligent, civilised in a debauched way and worshippers of the Old Powers. Some of them are even Blood sorcerers.

2 Body / 8 Fatigue / 5 Psyche / Singles / Enchanting Music

The Swarm

The Swarm can look human, but they sure don't act it. The Swarm are (or is, they may have some kind of gestalt consciousness) clouds of insects which can adapt themselves into a remarkably close facsimile of human shape, or any other shape no matter how outlandish. Their motivations are as yet unclear, they may not be hostile but should be treated with caution.

Also referred to as “serpent men”, which is an equally good description. These scaly humanoids are usually shapeshifters and come in five distinct flavours, one associated with each of the five Western Dragons. They tend to object to travellers in their lands, but are intelligent and rational so can be reasoned with.

Western Dragons are long, lithe and serpentine. Established mythology suggests that they are the children of the Old Power known as the Lady of All Serpents and the Prince of Breath known as the Frost Prince. There are generally thought to be five of them, each one distinct - these include Inskuldraes the Shapeless Worm, Barameus the God-King and Toramaes the Burning Ghost (for more information on these three see the Dragonfire & Deep Water LARP). There is no such thing as an “average” dragon, but most of them are Hard to Kill, usually needing something quite specific to finally get rid of them. Most Dragons can also adopt multiple shapes. Your average Western Dragon, then, will have stats along the following lines:

See Kit Fisable's notes “On Western Dragons” for more information, though this is all based on IC observation and not necessarily true.

Bloodwolves

Large wolves with fur that is bone white apart from a vaguely kiss-shaped red patch on their brow, bloodwolves were created by Vincenzi Velasquez in the summer of '05 as servants of the Lady of Blood & Wine. Fewer in numbers than ordinary wolves, but more intelligent and very hard to kill; they can only be permanently slain if killed by Blood Magic (or if subjected to a Blood Curse, or fed an Anti-Blood Potion, while unconscious and regenerating). Almost never seen outside the trackless depths of the Great Forest.

The North is a strange place, where the borders of Dream and reality shift and merge. The creatures of the North are equally strange, a mix of the real, the insubstantial, the imaginary and the downright bizarre. Both the Dream Powers (if they exist) and the Princes of Breath are associated with the Northern Mountains and the Whistful City, and many of the Northern creatures partake of the natures of Dream and Wind.

Dream-Catchers

Winged humanoids who dwell in the highest peaks of the Northern Mountains. They're generally polite to travellers, as long as nobody encroaches on their territory. They claim that they hunt nightmares and roast them over open fires in their grand halls. Their physical attacks are capable of harming ethereal creatures. See the Non-Humans page for more information.

3 Body / 6 Fatigue / 5 Psyche / Singles or Psychic Singles / Flight

Fears-of-Falling

This is the best name anybody's given them. The Fears-of-Falling are ethereal beings which haunt the high passes of the North. Anyone reduced to zero Psyche hits by a Fear-of-Falling will be possessed and seized by an irresistible compulsion to hurl themselves from a high place onto the ground below.

5 Psyche hits / Psychic Singles / Ethereal

Snow-Riders

These may or may not be sentient, they take a vaguely humanoid shape but are ultimately made of wind and snow. They ride in on the blizzards that blow down from the North. They are known to leave Priests of the Princes of Breath unmolested, and so are widely considered to be servants of those Powers.

5 Global hits / Fatigue n/a / Psyche n/a / Singles / Insubstantial

Rosemary Maids

The Rosemary Maids are a particularly bizarre species found in the extreme North. They are widely assumed to come from the Peak of Memory, but nobody can be sure. They appear as beautiful young women (and so, in fact, they are, it is not their faces which are false) and, at first, have no memories of who they are or what they are doing. When a Rosemary Maid encounters travellers she will ask them for assistance, explaining that she can't remember who she is. The canny will at this point run like hell. The uninitiated who offer her their hand will find themselves under psychic attack as the Rosemary Maid begins to steal their memories - the touch of a Rosemary Maid deals no physical damage, but deals Psychic Damage instead. Anybody reduced to zero Psyche hits by a Rosemary Maid will find themselves a complete tabula rasa, while the Maid will have all of their memories and therefore a deal of their personality. The memories will gradually fade over the course of a week or two, until the Rosemary Maid is again a blank slate looking for a fresh victim.

As you may expect, Shadows are generally found along the River of Shadows. They flow down from the Peak of Regret and fall upon anybody in their path. It has been said that those who truly have no regrets cannot be harmed by them, it is also said that they specifically target those who regret the least. Nobody is entirely sure.

The Eastern Plains hold the battlegrounds of the Binding Wars and the tombs or prisons of the Bound Ones. Watched by the Cloistered Brethren of Chains, the lands between the White City and the City of Crossroads are still populated by the remnants of armies and creatures who served in the Binding Wars.

Troglodytes

Short misshapen humanoids who seem to live in underground complexes throughout the Eastern Plains. They are comparatively intelligent, but are considered a threat by many because of the associations between the East, the underground and the Bound Ones. Their tribes can be very territorial, and they occasionally raid caravans going to the City of Crossroads.

1 Body / 5 Fatigue / 5 Psyche / Singles / Waves

Trapped Men

Not everything that was bound at the end of the Binding War deserved to be so, many men who were involved in some fashion with the war on the City of Chains became bound in one way or another. The Trapped Men are the descendants of those who, after the war, were bound in the bodies of animals. They have full human shape and reason after dark, but by day are largely bestial. Of late tribes of Trapped Men have been banding together and many believe them to be looking for a way to end their curse. In human form they will have the stats of any other Human, in animal form their stats will generally be within the range shown below, depending on what kind of animal they are. See the Non-Humans page for more information.

Unrelated to trolls, but they have a similar “big and stupid” schtick going on. Ogres do eat humans and are also accomplished shapeshifters. They're extremely easily fooled, which is probably a good thing because they're remarkably hard to kill. Sometimes they try to catch people off guard by turning themselves into something harmless looking but they generally have no gift for subterfuge. It is thought by some that the ogres fought with the Bound Ones in the Binding War, but nobody can say for certain.
Ogres aren't bright, but capable of Cockney-esque exclamations and various-object-changing-in-to based plotting. This helps differentiate them from Trolls.

These are mortal men who died while in service to the Bound Ones. Although they share the fate of their gods, some have found the strength to return to the world for a time and serve their masters once more. They appear much as they did in life, but bound around with chains. Their ultimate goal, of course, is to free themselves and their masters from bondage and they are willing to use lies or force to further this aim.

To the South of the White City lie the Garden Lands and the Port of Glass, the centre of worship of the Vitriarchs and home to many of their creations. Some of these things of Glass have been known to wander north…

Bodach

Half-human, not large or strong but very fast, the Bodach live in the Three Gardens they created to the southeast of what is now the White City. They like using long weapons but only do Singles with them. They are said to have the legs of falcons and have long poisonous claws. They are gardeners and lovers of beauty who really don't like it when you walk on their grass.

Small humanoid things summonable by obscure Glass magics known to Lemuel D'Artois, and perhaps to certain of his successors. They stand half the height of a man but are vicious in the extreme. Their danger lies not in their immediate physical threat but in the after-effects of their attacks, should anyone actually be injured by a splinter man for so much as half a point of damage they will find themselves slowly turning to glass as splinters of the thing work their way inwards. This process can take hours, days or weeks, and can be reversed by a skilled surgeon or a suitable spell or potion.

These are mindless, soulless men who are periodically ridden by Lemuel D'Artois, other local Glass sorcerers and strange things from the Glass Tower. These wretches provide disposable bodies to the “nobility” of the Port and are usually distinguishable only by their eyes. Though a Crystal Vessel has no Psyche hits of its own it may be inhabited by the spirit of another being in the same way as a body would normally house a being's spirit, and the inhabiting mind may be engaged in psychic combat normally.

Be very careful when looking into a mirror in the Port of Glass, it may be one of these things. You can easily detect them, because they replace your reflection in a mirror. Of course, by the time you've spotted them it may be too late. They are ethereal beings but can be destroyed if the mirror they inhabit is broken. If they reduce their victim to zero Psyche hits, they drag their prey's soul back to the Shattered Plain to eat.

7 Psyche hits / Psychic Singles / Ethereal

Glass Sentinels

These are the mainstays of the defence of the Port of Glass. They look like large humans carved out of cut glass and tend to carry big swords made of razor edged glass. Worse still they shatter when struck but stay together, meaning they are considerably less fragile than most Glass creatures. They can only be stopped by forcibly scattering their shards to the four winds, which will deal a level of damage to the arms of anyone not wearing medium or heavy armour.

The undead are found wherever people have the temerity to practice Ash magic in its corrupted form. They also periodically show up of their own accord. Please note that in the world of the White City the following four subtypes are the closest you're ever going to get to categorising the undead. It's either a ghoul, a spirit, a walking corpse or the living dead. In the world of the White City “lich” is just an archaic term for a corpse, “death knight” is a pseudonym adopted by a pretentious adventurer with Ashen leanings, “ghast” is largely meaningless and “mummy” is the person who is married to daddy.

Disembodied Spirits

The ethereal undead have a number of manifestations and a number of sources. They can be summoned back from the Burned Realm by Ash sorcerers or they can be trapped in the physical world by the circumstances of their death. Their stats will be similar to what they were in life, so potent Sorcerers and Priests tend to become potent spirits. The stats given below are for the spirit of a normal person.

5 Psyche hits / Psychic Singles / Ethereal

Walking Dead

Animated corpses. These could be skeletons, zombies or whatever; you get a corpse, you make it walk around. Walking dead are completely immune to Psychic Combat and never lose Psyche Hits. Many of the walking dead have unusual capabilities based around the circumstances of their deaths.

Ghouls are degenerate humans that eat the flesh of the dead, rather than actual undead. They have a degree of unnatural vitality but are ultimately entirely human in their capabilities. They are thoroughly condemned by the Burned Lords and so often flock to the banner of necromancers.

3 Body / 8 Fatigue / 5 Psyche / Singles / Maneater

Living Dead

These, after a fashion, are the true un-dead, since they are impossible to define as either living or dead. Such beings retain a good proportion of the qualities they had while living. The living dead have the same stats they had whilst living, but have doubled hits on all locations and count as Hard to Kill and/or Unrelenting. A note on undead sorcerers: due to their nature, the living dead cannot practice Blood magic or Wind magic, as both of those Forms of magic are too strongly tied to the living world to be usable. The living dead may practice Ash magic, but can never be Ordained Priests of the Burned Lords.

The various Powers and the sorcerers who wield their magics can send forth a variety of servants to do their bidding. A few of the more common ones are listed here.

Vampires

Vampires are really here as a non-entry. Due to the nature of magic in the world of the White City, vampires as we know and love them - stylish immortal undead beings with fangs - do not exist. The Burned Lords do not deal with blood, the Old Powers do not deal with the undead. Vampires do exist, but it's in a very different form. It is possible through Blood magic (probably about third or fourth level if anybody's interested) to retain your youth by drinking, bathing in or otherwise using the blood of other people. It is also possible to curse somebody with Blood magic (about fourth level) such that they need human blood to survive. This is the closest you're going to get to vampires.

Vitrimorphs

Vitrimorphs are things from the Tower of Glass. They're large humanoid creatures made of shattered glass, relatively fragile due to their glassy construction but abominably dangerous since their touch can inflict Psychic damage and anybody reduced to zero Psyche Hits by their blows has their soul consigned to the Shattered Plain and becomes a Crystal Vessel.

Sometimes referred to as Ashen Guardians, these are the guardians of the Burned Realm and they eradicate those things which are offensive to the Burned Lords. They appear as pale warriors in soot-blackened armour, and their swords can cut through flesh and spirit alike.

Of varying strength, these spirits are usually called up by Chain magic and appear as indistinct chained forms. The statistics below are for Bound LBOs, should they become free then double all their statistics.

No, your eyes do not deceive you, these are sample stats for Gods. We're not trying to create a setting where PCs tool up and go out to kill deities. We are trying to create a setting where the gods are on a relatively human level. Powerful, but not untouchable. Think in terms of a Classical/Norse model. Mortal heroes can deal with the gods almost on their own terms, and can get smacked down for their presumption. Some more information on gods and their followers is available on the Gods & Cults page.

The Rattle-Prince

Trickster and traitor, the Death-That-Cheats is one of the more commonly encountered deities. He wears many faces, but usually appears as a man. His manner is always charming and he seems never to speak above normal conversational level. He is only dangerous if you don't suspect him (and few people ever do), in direct confrontation he is no great threat. On the other hand he can do an immense amount of damage through deceit and malice.

One of the less subtle of the Old Powers, the Lord of the Blood-Fury is a straightforward warrior. He shows up in the middle of particularly violent battles and starts tearing people apart pretty much willy-nilly. He appears as a wild looking man with blood in his hair and may or may not be armed. He has the capacity to instil those about him with a berserk fury and very rarely leaves a place unbloodied.